The Trouble with Cats and Birds
by darke-jedi
Summary: HG/SS: Hermione and Serverus have a secret. One of Fred and George's pranks could allow Crookshanks to (ahem) let the cat out of the bag. Rated for innuendo.


**The Trouble With Cats And Birds**  
  
A response to a challenge set by diablogyrl (Amanda)  
  
**Author's note:** Just a quick and fairly silly story. I don't anticipate more than one further chapter. Usual disclaimer applies- I don't own the setting, the characters, the copyright, the royalties, or a fraction of the talent. See the bottom for the full challenge details. I admit I may have bent one of them a little but I hope it'll still count.  
  
Critique is good, critique is my bestest buddy, but if you're feeling that way inclined I'd rather you had a look at my other story, Wonders Unceasing, which is hopefully more worthy of your time despite the awful title. Thanks for reading!  
  
  
**Chapter One: The Chapter with No Name**  
  
It was early morning in the Gryffindor common-room. It was not too early for Harry Potter to be up and about: as the current Gryffindor Quiddich team captain, he now had the authority to drag the rest of the team out before breakfast for extra practice. There did not seem to be a practice that morning but he was up anyway, sitting on the rug next to a plain cardboard box. He was bent over his new Quicksilver 306 broomstick with a polishing-cloth in his hand and trying to hide a smirk. Hermione was already curled in an armchair, putting in a little preparation for the tutor group she would be supervising later that day while Crookshanks rumbled a contented purr from her lap. Neville was around as well, watering the window boxes he'd set up outside the Common Room windows. He cheerfully avoided the sleepy little flickers of flame as he woke the snapdragons, and tickled the bonsai pussy-willow until it purred too. Ginny Weasley perched on the seat beneath the windows, dodging the occasional stray drop of water and pretending to read a novel while watching Harry from beneath her fringe.  
  
It was too early for most of the other Gryffindors to have surfaced, and on a normal day Ron would not yet have emerged from the warm comfort of his bed without Harry's prompting and the vigorous application of a broom. Today, however, he announced his wakeful presence to the world as he hopped down the stairs from the dormitories two at a time. "Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me…"  
  
Hermione looked up guiltily as he bounded into the Common Room. "Uh… oh. Hi Ron."   
  
"Oh, hi?" Ron repeated, pausing suspiciously.   
  
"Happy birthday?" Hermione tried in a rather small voice.   
  
Harry stopped his polishing and stared at Ron, his face painted with horror. "It's your birthday?" he gasped. "Hermione, why didn't you remind me?"   
  
It's our final year," Hermione defended herself. "There's so much work for the N.E.W.T.s, it must have slipped my mind. I'm really sorry, Ron…"  
  
Ginny seemed to be trying to hide inside her book. "Oops," she whispered.   
  
Neville shuffled his feet and chewed his lip. "Um… yeah, sorry, Ron," he said unconvincingly, looking at the floor. "I, uh, forgot too."   
  
Ron glanced between the four of them, his initial expression of disappointed betrayal growing instead into one of dubiousness. "You all forgot?" He folded his arms, frowning slightly. "Riiight. Now stop mucking about. None of you could act to save your lives…" He thought about it. "Well, actually, you could," he admitted after a moment, "but you can't fool me."   
  
Harry laughed. "Okay Ron, we can't fool you." He picked a package from the box next to him, and held it out to his friend. "I suppose the surprise isn't so surprising after all. Happy birthday, Ron, careful, it's breakable."   
  
Ron grinned, collecting the parcel and holding up another. "This one's not."   
  
Harry and Hermione turned discerning eyes on the rather squashy-looking gift.   
  
"Let me guess," Harry said, "that's from your mum?"   
  
"Yup." Ron dropped into one of the free armchairs, plunking the two presents in his lap. "Turned up by Pig this morning."   
  
Harry was fishing in the box again. "Hey, Ron, the twins gave me this to give to you. They said 'happy birthday, if you eat them all at once then can you get Hermione to take notes so they'll know what happens because they'd never dare try it themselves'." He lobbed another package across the room.   
  
Ron caught it one-handed, then jiggled in his seat in jubilation. "Yes! The Gryffindor Keeper rules! I am the greatest!" he crowed, until Harry threw a tin of broomstick polish at him to get him to shut up.   
  
Eventually Ron was all but buried in wrapping paper and unwrapped presents, as everyone handed over the gifts they had tucked out of sight. He pulled at the edge of the bundle of knitted fabric sitting on top of the new Wizard chess set Harry had given him, holding it as he let the rest unroll. Unroll it did, firstly onto the floor and then right across the floor. A tinny-sounding voice piped up, singing Chudley Canons Quiddich chants.   
  
"Is that your mum's present?" Neville asked.   
  
"Ginny said she'd told your mum you might like a scarf instead of a jumper," Hermione explained. She waved a hand in the other girl's direction, without looking, as she pulled her own gift from its hiding place down the side of her seat. Crookshanks glared up at her indignantly from the floor for having dislodged him from her nice warm lap, then took refuge under Ron's chair. Hermione turned, glanced up, then down, and then along. "Oh my word! Is it really that… big…?"  
  
"Thank you, Mum," Ron said with a long-suffering sigh. A set of study-guides later, and he was left with the package from the Twins. He rubbed his hands together, cracked his knuckles, and set to. "Now _this_ ought to be good."   
  
The others came across to peer over his shoulders. Crookshanks pulled further under the chair to avoid getting accidentally kicked.   
  
"What's in it?" Harry asked.   
  
"Patience, my good friend," Ron declared, pulling items out one at a time for examination. "And patience is rewarded with… Sweets! Spock Rock?" he queried, waving a long, pink-and-white striped stick.   
  
Harry and Hermione exchanged grins. "Muggle film character," Harry said. "It probably makes your ears grow pointy."   
  
Ron grinned and rummaged some more. "Ton-Tongue Toffee, glad that pig you call a cousin didn't stop that idea, Harry… Cherry Bombs… Marsh Mallows, yuk, I can guess what those do… Lemming Drops… Canary Creams… Puffin Rice… Polly Pops…" he tried an experimental lick of a round blue-and-yellow lollipop. There was a faint 'pop', and the sweet fell to the ground and rolled beneath the chair as Ron vanished. In his place sat a blue-and-yellow macaw that peered at himself curiously, holding out his wings. "Brilliant!" squawked the bird, in Ron's voice. "Pieces of eight! Polly wants a cracker!"   
  
Hermione giggled, poked around in the box from the twins, and tried to feed him a pale, flat square from a packet marked 'water biscuits'.   
  
"I'm a bird-brain, not an idiot," the macaw claimed, refusing the biscuit. He flapped his wings. "Much better than a canary! Have you seen the size of my beak? Hey, wonder if I can fly?" Before he could try, Ron returned to his usual shape with a second pop, hastily twisting himself out of the seat to avoid crushing his presents. "Brilliant!" he exclaimed. "Hey, where did the Polly Pop go?"   
  
"You dropped it," Harry said, bending down to check. He saw Crookshanks carefully sniffing the Polly Pop, giving it a cautious lick… "Crookshanks!" he warned, but he was too late. With an alarmed yowl that rose rapidly into a squawk, Crookshanks shot out from beneath the chair. Dusty ginger fur became dusty grey feathers, the sole remaining ruddy tint now concentrated in a short red tail. The parrot that had been a cat flew across the room, the instincts for flight apparently included as part of the polymorphing spell, and scrabbled to a stop on top of the mantelpiece.   
  
"Crookshanks! Oh, you poor pusscat!" Hermione hurried over to comfort her familiar. "Never mind, the spell will wear off in a few seconds... if it works the same way for cats as for humans" She stroked his head with a finger. "I hope it does. Aw, you poor fuzzy-wuzzy little kittenpuss."   
  
"Oh please," muttered the parrot. "I like the stroking, that feels goooood," Crookshank's voice dropped to a very sexy growl, and he quivered his feathers. Hermione was so disconcerted that she took a step back. Crookshanks eyed her knowingly. "But cut out the baby talk. In cat years I'm older than you, _and_ I've seen you naked."   
  
Hermione went bright red. Ron and Harry were suddenly sporting smiles that stretched right around their heads.   
  
"Now that's what I call a good trick," Ron said, his eyes sparking with rather lewd mischief. "Wonder if there are any Cat Mints in that box…"  
  
"Ron, don't even think about trying it," Hermione warned. "You are never, ever going to see me naked, and if I catch you trying you're going straight to the vet to get neutered!"   
  
"Ooh, she's almost edible when she's angry," Crookshanks commented, then squacked in surprise as Hermione grabbed him in both hands, ignoring his attempts to attack her with his beak.   
  
"You're going back to the dormitory until the spell wears off," Hermione told the parrot in furious embarrassment, hurrying towards the stairs.   
  
"Aw, shame," complained Harry.   
  
"Don't worry, Crookshanks, we'll come let you out when she's gone," Ron hissed in a stage whisper.   
  
"Anyone who tries it gets hexed from here until Christmas," Hermione's voice threatened from the stairs.   
  
"Crookshank's right, she's quite something when she's angry," Ron told Harry.   
  
"I heard that!" The door to the girl's dormitory slammed shut, and those left in the Common Room collapsed into laughter.   
  
"See you at breakfast, Hermione?" Ginny called after her, amused but slightly apologetic, but there was no reply.   
  
"Never mind, Ginny, she'll get over it," Harry said, still chuckling. "Coming?" He offered his arm, and Ron went into a fresh bout of sniggering when Ginny almost tripped over in her haste to take it.   
  
"C'mon Neville," Ron managed finally, "give us a hand carrying this lot up to the dormitory?"   
  
Moments later the Common Room was empty, apart from the brightly-striped blue-and-yellow lollipop that still lay with seeming innocence beneath one of the chairs.   
  
******  
  
The first class of the day and Snape swept into the Potions classroom like an overdone cliché, whirling before his desk to glower over the small class. The impressive entrance and intimidating attitude never failed to set the First Years trembling in their seats, but were less effective when applied to the Seventh Year Advanced Potions pupils. It was, after all, an optional subject, and the only students who dared take it were those who had the determination or self-confidence to weather the Potion Master's critical comments and uncertain temper. Snape opened his mouth to address the class: a mouth that was, as usual, twisted slightly into a dissatisfied sneer.   
  
"Today we're going to be making shampoo, because I ran out twenty years ago and I'm too much of a tight-fisted git to buy any more."   
  
The students gave a collective blink. It was Snape's voice, but those who dared look at his face had not seen his lips move. Snape himself had grown red in the face. The solitary Hufflepuff in the class, slightly less resilient than the other pupils, was already slumping lower in his seat ready to dive completely beneath his desk. A couple of Slytherins hastily stifled sniggers. The two Ravenclaws had the grace to look puzzled. Hermione had her mouth open, her cheeks reddening as she stared, not at Snape but at the high, narrow window at the back of the classroom.   
  
Without looking, Snape waved his wand over his shoulder and muttered a few words. There was a disconcerted squawk and a rapid fluttering as something dodged the hex aimed towards the window. A rather dowdy little shape blazed past the Potions Master in a blur of whirring wings, snatching the wand out of his grip. It did not escape unscathed- Snape's lightning-fast snatch at the creature rewarded him with a bunch of dusty red tail-feathers. The animal gave another squawk and swooped upwards to settle on an empty torch sconce, revealing itself as an irate grey parrot with a somewhat bald crimson tail.   
  
The parrot held up the wand in one foot, and closed his open beak threateningly around it. "Watch it, mate. Mess with the tail, and the wand gets it."   
  
"Miss Granger," Snape purred ominously as he regarded the bird, "perhaps you can explain what _that_ is and why it is in my Potions classroom."   
  
"It's a cat," Hermione began. Nervous laughter fluttered through the classroom.   
  
Snape's irritated sigh came out as a hiss. "Miss Granger, do you need spectacles as well as braces? It looks very much like a parrot."   
  
"Looks aren't everything," the parrot remarked. "Would've thought _you'd_ know that."   
  
"Twenty points from Gryffindor for cheek," Snape snapped.   
  
The parrot eyed him indignantly. "Jumping to conclusions here, aren't we? I've always thought of myself as more of a Slytherin type."   
  
Snape apparently ignored the bird, but his voice could have frozen a potion of Eternal Fire. "Miss Granger, I believe you were attempting to offer an explanation… although your efforts so far do not lead me to hold any great hopes regarding your success in the matter."   
  
Hermione kept her expression unchanged, but she was clearly both indignant and cross. The days when an unkind comment could reduce her to tears were long gone. "It's Crookshanks, sir," she said, making the effort not to speak through clenched teeth. "My familiar. He _was_ a cat, until Fred and George Weasley decided it would be 'a good wheeze' to send Ron some trick sweets for his birthday, and Crookshanks licked one. I left him shut in my room, but R… but someone must have let him out. I think he must have got into the dungeons through the window."   
  
Snape's face twitched, the professor torn between irritation at the practical joke and sadistic humour at Hermione's predicament. "I had always believed that cats were among the more intelligent of creatures. It seems there must always be one exception to every rule."   
  
The parrot regarded Snape with psittacustic arrogance. "Au contraire. Some of us play down our mental acuity in order not to make humans feel inadequate."   
  
"And in order to grow feathers," Snape pointed out dryly.   
  
"Talking to birds now, Professor?" the parrot asked snidely.   
  
Snape scowled. "I have no time to converse with overly garrulous avians. This is a Potions class. Get that… _thing_ out of here immediately, Miss Granger, or Gryffindor will be another fifty points short and the classroom will find itself furnished with an interesting new item of feathered taxidermy."   
  
The parrot cocked his head to one side, the tip of his beak tapping the wand. "Ooh, I'm scared! Wrap me in leather and whip me with chains, big boy…"  
  
Snape paled. Hermione froze, just her eyes rolling to exchange nervous glances with the Potions Master.   
  
The parrot regarded them both with glee. "She _told_ you I was her familiar, Snakeypoo. And she tells her familiar _everything_."  
  
******  
  
**Challenge details**  
  
As already mentioned, this story is being written in response to a challenge set on the WIKTT yahoo group by diablogyrl. The challenge runs as follows:  
  
**Scenario:** Two individuals at Hogwarts form an unlikely couple, but want to keep it absolutely silent. We all know whom, people! As a genuine or gag gift, one of them receives a talking parrot. Much distress and hilarity should ensue. Or not, if that is your preference, angst- fanatics!  
  
**Requirements:** Must include mention of the following:  
  
- a wise cracking, agile tongued, very observant parrot  
  
- a surprise   
  
- a widespread, vague rumor  
  
- questionable positions and/or badly executed charms  
  
Must include at least 3 of the following phrases:  
  
- "What is that gooey stuff in your hair?"  
  
- "Do it upside down!" which must also be echoed by the parrot at a decidedly inopportune time  
  
- "Wrap me in leather and whip me with chains, big boy…"  
  
- "It's kind of… small…"  
  
- "Oh my word! Is it really that… big…?"  
  
- a passing reference to a gay bird  
  
- "Alright, who was watching?" 


End file.
